Thunder and lightning and heavy rain pounding on the roof as I begin this post. An atmosphere for murder!
I was laid low by a germ (not Covid) over the long weekend, and all I could do was read for three days, and all I wanted was crime and murder tales, which I indulged in completely. There's nothing like a good murder mystery to make a person forget their discomfort.
I know that many of you must have read at least some of the Lake District Mysteries by Martin Edwards. I read the first in the series, The Coffin Trail, and liked it very much. Really liked the primary police detective Hannah Scarlett and the newbie to the Lake District, historian Daniel Kind. Loved it. Just what I needed. I will eventually read on in this series.
I also loved the debut cozy mystery, The Unkindness of Ravens, by M.E. Hilliard (2021). Almost all of the action is set in a three-story nineteenth-century manse, which is the town library. Set in a community near Albany, New York, though frankly, the elaborate library setting is paramount here, rather than the upstate New York setting. Greer Hogan is a former cosmetics executive who saw the light after the murder of her husband and got her degree in library science. This novel was very entertaining, and frankly, though I find cozies boring at times, this one kept me going. I must admit I'm looking forward to the second in the series, due to appear in April 2022. Read this in less than a day.
And I had plenty of time to finish up a chunkster I started earlier in the week--the new novel by Joyce Maynard, Count the Ways. (Rated 4.35 on Goodreads.) It was very, very good, though sad in many ways and redeeming in others. It's about a family, and a husband and wife, and everything that happens to them on their farm in New Hampshire. I love Joyce Maynard's novels.
Ann Cleeves's second novel in her new Matthew Venn series was published yesterday, The Heron's Cry. I loved the first offering and am looking forward to getting my copy in the mail soon.